


A Sense of Belonging

by BorgRelic



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Picard
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, hugh doesn't die, like angst for sure but it turns out good i promise, set on the artifact at the end of pic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2020-04-06
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:21:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23519101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BorgRelic/pseuds/BorgRelic
Summary: Hugh finds a home, and then loses it. Over and over. But maybe out of this mess he can finally find home again for good.
Relationships: Elnor/Hugh | Third of Five
Comments: 6
Kudos: 43





	A Sense of Belonging

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a lot of borg feelings fuelled by the fact that it's midnight and i'm listening to cigarettes after sex

He’s waiting for the inevitable. The Borg ship he knows, his home, he’s sure it will be his grave. There’s an army hunting him and Elnor and it can’t be long now. He almost smiles at the cruel irony of the situation; he finds a home and loses it. And finds and loses. And it’s happened again. He is about to die, alone in the universe.

He remembers the all-encompassing sense of belonging that was being part of the Collective. He wasn’t an individual, he was a small part in an infinitely huge machine, held in place alongside the other parts with metal rods in his mind that should have been unbreakable. As they moved, he moved. As they thought, he thought. No separation, just utter whole belonging. They were cruel, merciless, abhorrent, and when Hugh thought too much about it he felt sick. But the ease of being and simplicity of belonging was unmatched in the universe. And then he broke loose.

His time on the Enterprise gave him many things, a name and a voice. While it was arguably where his life started in earnest, it was also where he first died. The loss of belonging, well he would spend the rest of his life trying to regain that.

It started with Geordi. Dear, sweet, kind Geordi. Geordi who gave him a name and taught him about the big stuff: self, decisions, _individuality._ But who had also taught him chess and what tea is and how good it feels to kiss someone with hands holding his cheeks and- he had to stop. So much time had passed but it had not even begun to heal the hole in his heart made by his decision to leave Geordi. His own stupid fault, he thought. His own fault. And now he’s here, waiting in this metal cube to die.

This ship, the Artifact, his most recent parody of a home. He loved it and hated it in equal measure. It allowed him to have purpose; he could be part of a team, even if it was far from any sort of family or friendship he had once known on the Enterprise. But it was also unbearable - to live in a version of place he knew so intimately, but this one was dead, hollow. Like a wasp’s nest with the insects smoked out, it was just an empty shell where there had once been activity and focus and connection. The place was seeped in the left-over thoughts of the collective. They drifted through the walls to him as he worked, calling him back to his place in the now dead machine, like echoes. You can’t run from echoes, he found.

He knew that what they were calling him to was long gone, but when the Romulans were asleep and he sat in this quarters in the quiet, the echoes were so loud that re-joining the Collective almost seemed preferable. Submitting to the all-consuming Collective was impossible; they were dead here. But to experience just one thought, a singular voice instead of this constant inescapable noise, well that seemed like paradise to Hugh.

There are noises now, in the corridor outside the cell.

A queencell, which had once been the centre of his being, turned into the last place in the universe he wished to be. It is a cell, and he is a prisoner.

He looks over to Elnor who is kneeling, one hand on the sword sheathed on his back, his eyes closed. He’s waiting for a fight.

Then Elnor motions to him to get behind a low control desk on the other side of the room, a second before the Romulans enter. From his hiding position, he hears the sick sounds of metal through flesh and bodies hitting the ground and cries and screams. He closes his eyes and waits. And waits. And waits.

He feels a hand on his arm and jumps, but it’s not Narissa or the _Tal Shiar_ come for him. It’s Elnor. Dear, sweet, brave Elnor. Blood stains his cheek and his long hair is plastered against his forehead with the sweat of the fight, but he is alive and looking at Hugh with wide concerned eyes and a weak smile. “It’s over, Hugh.” His voice is quiet and a little shaky, but it’s the most calming sound Hugh has heard in years. Elnor sits next to him, leaning against Hugh, and Hugh can feel his rapid heartbeat and smell the fear, relief, and exhaustion.

He hears the crackle of the comms device at Elnor’s wrist, a message from their friends scattered about the Galaxy. Something big has happened and Hugh can’t quite make it out but it doesn’t matter, he gets the message. They’re safe. It’s over.

Hobbling to the shuttle bay to re-join the _La Sirena_ , with Elnor holding his hand, pulling him forward though those dark corridors, he feels like he’s finally making his way home.


End file.
